


of the smiles we left behind

by frostbitten_cheeks



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: 29/08/15 canon mark, M/M, School Reunion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-04
Updated: 2015-09-04
Packaged: 2018-04-19 00:32:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4726079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frostbitten_cheeks/pseuds/frostbitten_cheeks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some things change and some things don’t. They go to Phil's school reunion and the ways in which things have remained the same start chiming louder and louder.</p>
            </blockquote>





	of the smiles we left behind

**Author's Note:**

> a semi-fic about how change is as terrifying as the lack of, and about how just because you don’t want to define something within structured lines doesn’t mean it won’t be defined for you.
> 
> (link to this fic [on tumblr](http://literaryphan.tumblr.com/post/128336169086/of-the-smiles-we-left-behind))

I.

The invitation sits in his inbox for three days, four, seventeen. It’s untouched but he marks it with a star so he won’t lose it, even though he tells Dan he doesn’t want to go when Dan asks.

Eighteen, nineteen, thirty-three. On Wednesday he opens the reply and doesn’t thumb through his yearbook to search for the face of the name that signed the email. He types, _I’ll be there_ , doesn’t add a smiley. Dan eats lunch on the sofa and says nothing.

 

 

-

 

 

II.

“I don’t have to come,” Dan says. He works his jaw around the words like they mean something, like it isn’t the hundredth time he’s said so. He draws his shoulders close and seems less broad than a moment before, tucks his elbows in, says, “You don’t have to take me,” again.

Phil drops his eyes to his laptop screen, says, “You should come,” doesn’t fake a smile. He doesn’t like falsely curving his face into that, doesn’t like feeling like a liar. Dan shifts closer to the faraway corner of the sofa, drawn-shoulders and tucked-in elbows and a pressed mouth that holds words he doesn’t want to say. They don’t talk about how Dan coming means something. They don’t talk about anything at all.

 

 

-

 

 

III.

Dan knows Phil wants to take him, also knows why he’s uncertain. He says neither of the two because neither of those matters, in the long run, because neither of those would change a thing. He spreads his warm fingers over Phil’s shoulder and breathes onto the nape of his neck. Phil throws socks into the bag and drains all the air out of his lungs until they’re shrivelled and wrinkled and small.

 

 

-

 

 

IV.

“Last chance, okay? You really don’t have to take m--“

“Dan. Stop.”  


 

 

-

 

 

V.

He wants Dan there, he wants Dan there, he wants Dan there. He curls into his side of the bed and tells the dents in the walls he wants Dan there, and they believe him because he’s telling the truth. He doesn’t smile, because he’s not a liar. He wants Dan everywhere and the thing is, that’s the problem.

 

 

-

 

 

VI.

He almost misses the train and he gets on it with the wrong bag and his phone uncharged and sweat dripping down his forehead, his chin, the back of his neck. Dan tips his head into his seat and offers him a bottle of Fanta in silence, his features twisting, offering him a smile. They share the armrest between their seats, share the three-hour train ride, share the daily crossword in the newspaper they find on the next seat. Dan maps his finger over the paper and says, _one's wrong to eat no protein is myosin_ , presses his gentle smiles to the crook of Phil’s angles without touching.

Twenty minutes past the first hour mark, Dan falls asleep on Phil’s shoulder and Phil thinks of Japan. The train ride to Manchester isn’t Tokyo and it isn’t private and the man across the aisle watches them, intrigued, but Phil doesn’t shrug Dan off. He folds the newspaper in half and tells the torn stitches in the filling of the empty seat across of him that he wants Dan there, quirks the corners of his mouth into a smile, doesn’t feel like too much of a liar.

 

 

-

 

 

VII.

The train station in Manchester looks the same as when they left, five suitcases between them and pockets full of nothing except groundless faith. Off the train, they order a taxi in clothes that cost more than they used to spend on a week’s food and a subscribers count that’s tripled itself twice, and yet the floors are muddy in the same places, the glass-windows tinting the same way. Manchester hasn’t changed but they have and Phil’s chest clenches once, twice, stops. Dan finds a taxi and the motions carry on.

 

 

-

 

 

VIII.

“—I work in accountancy now, actually, but it’s only temporary because -–“

“—had two kids, Oli and Meghan, little monsters but they’re me babies –-“

“—getting married next summer, you know, right after I quit this job -–“

Phil drinks four glasses of wine, listens to a round of people sat at this restaurant table talk about their lives, people who wear the faces of his old friends like they’re still them even though they’re not. The tips of Dan’s fingers under the table touch his knee and his skin is burning, burning, burnt. The round stop on Phil and he shrugs one shoulder and says, “Not much, I guess,” turns his knee away. They laugh. He doesn’t.

 

 

-

 

 

IX.

He smiles and feels like a liar. A girl and her mum approach the table and ask for a picture with red cheeks and wet smiles, and the table is silent while they take it, hungry eyes revealing nothing. The girl thanks them and walks away and someone restarts the conversation again. Under the table, Phil grabs Dan’s hand and squeezes it hard. Dan curls his fingers around his wrist and holds.

 

 

-

 

 

X.

The bottom line isn’t the man on the train that saw them, isn’t the risk of someone knowing. The bottom line is they walk into the restaurant and Helen shakes Dan’s hand and says, “Oh, you’re the plus one,” and no one questions it. The bottom line is what _plus one_ means. The bottom line is stability.

 

 

-

 

 

XI.

The _2006 class_ reunion hall is a larger-scale restaurant table, bigger words and bigger eyes and bigger faces. Phil drinks wine from bigger glasses and answers bigger questions with a bigger smile, feels like a bigger liar. Dan stands by his side with one shoulder pressed against his, holds on tighter. Nobody asks but everyone’s asking and the absence is ringing in Phil’s ears.

“I’m glad you’re happy,” says a guy from Phil’s psychology class ten years back, who stretches his smiles and doesn’t really ask if Phil’s happy. Phil is happy, though, so he widens his own and thanks the guy whose name he doesn’t know, doesn’t say that happiness isn’t something you can make assumptions about, instead turns away.

 

 

-

 

 

XII.

Dan presses his cheek to the mirror in the small restroom and says, “I can’t do this, I can’t,” leaves condensation on the glass from his breath. Outside the door the masses are bustling and Phil can’t handle it either, leans over the sink and sighs.

An hour later, Dan’s phone buzzes with retweets, and his face is tight enough for Phil to see the mask that’s underneath. Phil hands him his twelfth glass and calls him _captain crisis_ quietly, just to watch his smile. Dan wasn’t joking but the people around them are circling and there’s not a moment of peace, not a moment of silence, and now isn’t the time.

“I’m fine,” Dan tells someone who happens to be following him on Twitter. Phil nods over his shoulder and _fine_ tastes the same as _I want you there_ on his tongue.

 

 

-

 

 

XIII.

Right at the middle between causal relationships and long-lasting marriages there’s a chalk-drawn line, and some things, sometimes, have the same effect of dragging a bare foot across the chalk that’s on the pavement, blurring the lines between what is stable and what is not.

 

 

-

 

 

XIV.

Reunions are a showcase, button-downs and jewellery and your personal arsenal, _here are the things I’ve accomplished, here is who I now am_. It’s a war won with six-digit salaries and golden watches, won with penthouse apartments and heeled wives.

Phil smooths a hand down his patterned shirt and wins with a radio job and a two-million people following, wins with a humble smile and colourful shoes. He introduces Dan with a pointed smile and bitten words and doesn’t say he’s part of the arsenal, but people tip their wineglasses and smile at him like he is.

The bottom line isn’t that you bring your best to the table and make do. The bottom line is that out of everyone you know, everyone you love, everyone you’ve ever dated, you only bring one to a reunion. The bottom line is that brining a plus one to a reunion isn’t a date but a statement, and Phil bites chattering teeth around what this statement means.

 

 

-

 

 

XV.

Phil’s mum shakes her head at adopting a pet, says, _might as well get married_. In a reunion hall, Phil stands with a crowd of people who used to shape the background of his life with Dan talking by his side, a constant presence. Phil fists his fear inside trembling hands and wonders what his mum will have to say about that.


End file.
